The invention relates to an apparatus for and method of saturating or coating a travelling web of material by means of a controlled curtain of the saturant or coating.
The travelling web is treated by the controlled cascading of the saturant over an inclined slideway and applying same in the form of a free-falling vertical curtain of the saturant which impinges onto the travelling web so as to form a layer thereupon and/or to saturate therethrough, according to the particular characteristics of the saturant and/or of the web, and/or the exploitation of various suction devices according to the desired characteristics of the end product.
The apparatus may be used singly to allow a single layer of the coating, such as a binder, to be added to the travelling web, or a plurality thereof may be used in tandem to allow a plurality of seriatim layers of coating to be added thereto. And if desired, the apparatus may be used cooperantly with a series of suction or vacuum devices for purposes of more precisely conditioning the web by a progressive series of operations applying varying degrees of negative pressure.